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Entry: Better to Blow Out One Candle than Curse the Light Link: http://www.takimag.com/blogs/article/better_to_blow_out_one_candle_than_curse_the_light#16050 Post contents: Coda to my above comment: The primitive church adapted and "converted" (one could even say metaphorically "baptised") many of the pagan customs and holidays of the several major peoples of the Roman Empire. For example, St Valentine's Day is a Christianised adaptation of what used to be a day of socially mandated orgies. And JZ's Celtic ancestors and mine used to behave very badly around what is now the eve of All Saints. Then there were all of those rites of Human Sacrifice and wailing for the dead and resurrected son/lover of the Goddess (Venus and/or the Moon), around the summer solstice. Etc etc. And then there are all of those ancient Eygptian symbols which the Church converted, like Osiris (and the Pharaoh) holding a shepherd's crook in one hand and a flail in the other - the dual role of moral guidance and enforcement of law - and that's the background of Jesus saying his "winnowing fan is in his hand" while his Good Shepherd's crook is in the other. The Bishop's shepherd's crook is a symbolic descendant of the "conversion" of ancient Egyptian symbols to Christianity. Because it makes perfect sense to use the symbols to which people are accustomed, as means of evangelising the Gospel to them. St Paul wrote (I forget where) about the old pagan religions, something like, "What you used to worship in ignorance, now we understand in truth", or something like that. So I ask again, why shouldn't today's Church adapt, and convert and "baptise" some symbols and old wisdom of Far Eastern religions, in order to evangelise the Far East? Not to mention bringing back many Western Christians who have gotten lost in Far Eastern religions, to make it clear to them that all AUTHENTIC wisdom and truths of the Far East come ultimately from Christ? Sent at: 2008 07 24